Left Handed!
By James Castwell

I don't mean to offend some of you but I need
to make a point. There is nothing that looks
much goofier than watching a guy hold a shotgun
right handed and crane his neck over so he can
sight down the thing with his left eye. Sorry,
breaks me up. Please no offense. If you do it
that way and it works, wonderful. Especially if
you can shoot that way and not damage your nose
with your right thumb. It must be how you were
taught. I would like a few minutes with your
teacher though.

This is of course a master eye thing. Easily
diagnosed in a earlier
column. It may surprise you to find that I
teach off-hand (left for a right handed and right
for a left handed) about half an hour into my basic
casting classes. This is when I have firmly
established the simple basics of the cast. With
these now in the mind of the caster I have them
put the rod in the 'off hand.' Yes, there is a
lot of moaning and groaning. To their amazement
though, they do rather well. I have them take it
very slowly at first so each cast is correct and
then repeat the correct moves which produced it.

Some students are even able to do better off handed
than with their dominant hand. And there is often a
very good reason for this. These are usually those
who have been using spinning gear for some time and
have the spinning rod casting motion well ingrained
into the dominant hand and arm. This is also the way
I break some from the inability to make a fair fly
rod cast with the dominant hand. After they have
gotten used to a bit of casting with the off hand,
I explain I knew they could cast, it's just that
they are refusing to do so. A bit of humor and they
realize they will have to teach their rod hand to
cast one element at a time now that their off hand
know's how to cast.

What is really neat about this is that by having
them learn to cast with both hands early on in
the game they have learned not only with both
hands, but both sides of their brain as well. Sort
of locked it in there. At times I will separate the
cast into a few parts for them. Perhaps a name on
each element; back, stop, pause, forward, stop,
pause, etc. Sometimes it helps. Sometimes they
will call out these names at each part of the cast
the first few times. Hey, if it works, go for it.

I hope you will at least try this for yourself,
most will have no trouble at all and will soon
be able to make some fair casts with the off hand.
You will get about as good as you want or need to
be at this, that's your call. The off hand and arm
will prove much weaker than you thought they would
be at first. Keep that in mind when teaching others
who have not in some way trained their sets of muscles
to respond either by second nature or at least on
direct command. Time and practicing the right things
makes for proficiency.

I still have a problem casting left handed with
accuracy but can get it close enough to get the
job done most of the time. Here's a real challenge,
teach yourself the double-haul with your off hand.
A lot like the 'rubbing the belly and patting the
head' thing. It can be done but like making sausage
too, 'not pretty to watch.'

Oh sure, you can learn to cast across your body and
all sorts of contorted motions, heck those are just
normal day-to-day things in fly-fishing. We never
have the room or the place to make a cast as it
should be, there is always some little thing forcing
us into a new posture of cast. Heck, isn't that part
of the fun? ~ JC